1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a support for stabilizing the frame of a recreational vehicle and includes a locking arrangement for preventing access to the king pin of such vehicle.
2. Description of the Prior
With the present day popularity of recreational vehicles of the type which incorporate a king pin for attachment to a towing vehicle, the use of such recreational vehicle and towing vehicle has been expanded. Often times such towing vehicles are, upon arrival at a vacationer's destination, detached from the towed vehicle and utilized for transportation on side trips. When the tourist is then absent from presence in or about such recreational vehicle, the vehicle itself presents an enormous temptation for unauthorized persons to take possession thereof and remove it to a remote site where the vehicle itself may be broken into for removal of valuable contents or the vehicle itself sold as a used vehicle. It is the ready access to the king pin of such towable recreational vehicles that enhances the temptation to hook onto such unattended vehicle with a towing vehicle to remove it from its unattended site.
Another problem presents itself when occupants move about the interior of the vehicle when detached. Typically, the forward end of the towed vehicle is supported by extended telescopical leveling posts or other supports located at the corners and which must be carefully adjusted for leveling the vehicle for the comfort of the occupants to thus provide support against shifting of the enclosure relative to the supporting rear axle upon movement of the occupant from side to side within the interior thereby resulting in different weight and balance on the suspension springs. The incorporation of such leveling support legs within the body of the towed vehicle is an expensive proposition and, by itself, fails to prevent any significant obstacle to the unauthorized taking of such an unattended vehicle when detached from the towing vehicle. Consequently, there exists a need for a support apparatus which may be temporarily attached to the fifth wheel of the recreational vehicle for support of the front extremity of such vehicle in a manner which will present resistance to tilting of the vehicle on its suspension springs and which will also restrict access to such fifth wheel by unauthorized persons who do not have a key or other combination to release of the support apparatus.
Recognition of the security problems attendant unattended towable vehicles has led to the proposals of numerous different styles of locking collars attachable to the detached king pin of such vehicle. Examples of such prior locking collars are disclosed in the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,656,706; 2,785,564; 3,004,421; 3,269,159; 3,832,872; 3,982,413; 4,141,233; and 4,691,935. It is a general characteristic of prior art locking collars that they typically form a close fit with the fifth wheel, thus securing such collars against any significant movement relative to such fifth wheels. This characteristic, while in many instances adequately restricting unauthorized access to such fifth wheels, constitutes a restriction on the utility of such locking collars as an attachment mechanism for a strut support which might act to support the front extremity of the vehicle and afford resistance to rocking of the vehicle on its suspension springs.
Efforts to provide a satisfactory and stabilizing device has led to the proposal of a pair of extendable, divergent, strutlike legs connected at their top ends by means of a collar to the fifth wheel of a recreational vehicle and constrained on their bottom extremities by a chain. A device of this type is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,596,371 to Clark and assigned to the assignee of the rights in this application. Such a stabilizing device, while satisfactory for its intended purpose, suffers the shortcoming that it makes no provision for locking of the collar to the fifth wheel to thereby restrict access by unauthorized persons.